LOL Yeah, okay whatever you say, grasshopper. Anybody who works/or has worked there definitely aren't right wing. 🤦🏽♂️ The author is making the point that they've moved to being more neoliberal.
Persistent rumors that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia over the election became the catnip that drove reporting. [...]
But when the Mueller report found no credible evidence of collusion [...]
Aaaaand I stopped reading.
The Mueller Report absolutely found credible evidence of collusion, despite heavy-handled interference by Trump, Barr, and the rest of the GOP. It unfortunately failed to result in any prosecution (in no small part due to Barr), and failed to pressure Republicans to vote to remove Trump when he was impeached.
Insufficient evidence to prove a crime? Maybe. I disagree, but I'm neither a lawyer nor a judge.
But "collusion" itself isn't a crime, and the evidence clearly showed evidence of collusion between the GOP and Russia.
The number of connections between the GOP and Russia, financially and ideologically, and Russia's proven interference in 2016 and since (not to mention the GOP visit to Moscow on July 4th) are evidence enough to show there is "collusion".
The problem is our laws on campaign finance and foreign political influence are Swiss cheese.
And then they turn around and act like, "Well, he didn't get convicted of a crime, so clearly it was all a hoax."
No. It wasn't a hoax. There was evidence. Just not enough to do anythong about it, apparently. (And I still argue only because of the amount of interference run on the investigation.)
EDIT: And just in case you want to come back and obtusely repeat your argument, here's the report in full. After 181 pages of evidence, here's the conclusion.
IV. CONCLUSION
Because we determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgment, we did not draw ultimate conclusions about the President’s conduct. The evidence we obtained about the President’s actions and intent presents difficult issues that would need to be resolved if we were
making a traditional prosecutorial judgment. At the same time, if we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the President clearly did not commit obstruction of justice,
we would so state. Based on the facts and the applicable legal standards, we are unable to reach that judgment. Accordingly, while this report does not conclude that the President committed a
crime, it also does not exonerate him.
Its in black and white: they had already determined that they would not make a "prosecutorial judgment" (recommendation to charge Trump with a crime), since Barr said that should be left to the Impeachment process. But despite that, the report makes clear, in no unclear terms...
Obstruction of justice is a different accusation than collusion with Russians. The report states that there is insufficient evidence to prove collusion, but there may be a case to prove obstruction of justice if they decided to pursue it. But they aren't going to. Which means absolutely nothing, at the end of the day. You can't work with it, can't assume anything or draw any conclusions. It's not even a hypothesis let alone one that can be proven or not proven.
Illegally block investigation into the original crime.
Because of your obstruction, insufficient evidence of your original crime is found to force prosecution.
Now that you blocked the original charges, you can claim it was all bogus. You can't "obstruct justice" if there was no crime in the first place, _right?!_
So, obstruction of justice is legal now, so long as you succeed. Got it. Thanks.
Also, fuck off. I'm not reading another reply. You are unwilling to discuss this topic in good faith, or you lack the brain cells to do so.
Just curious what exactly you got from it, and how you reconcile that against what all of the news reported and concluded. Mueller report states that the investigation "did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in it's election interference activities". What does that mean to you?
Read the report and listen to what Mueller said he thought were the appropriate boundaries of his job. He refused to make judgments and focused on putting facts and evidence in the report. Fox and Republicans twisted that into the narrative that you are repeating. Mueller didn't find collusion because he refused to take that role, supposedly believing that the elected representatives were the ones that would take an honest look at the report and make that judgement. But you are asking those questions because you want to deflect away from you making claims about without having read it. All news didn't reach the same conclusion. All right-wing propaganda did though.
PBS, NPR, American Bar Association, etc are not what I would call right wing propaganda, but I guess it's relative. If I understand correctly though, your stance is that Mueller was simply getting the information out there for others to act on if they chose to. In that case, why have they not acted? My impression from legal summaries, including from the American bar association, is that they are not pursuing it because the Mueller report couldn't find enough evidence to build a case. I trust their assessment and summary of the report more than what I can get out of reading it myself in it's entirety.
So what really happened? Nobody knows for sure and there is not enough evidence to do anything about it. It's a non-topic.
How long until he gets jail time? How many continuous years of lawsuits and investigations before they get him? Is the system really that broken that he keeps getting away with it or are the charges simply weak to begin with? Tbh I don't really know, but I have serious Trump fatigue.
I think that an honest assessment of Trump's handling by the legal system shows that there is plenty to go after him for and that he has been given far too much leeway. The system is broken in the sense that it relies on being populated by good faith actors instead of loyalists to a demagogue.
I think that the motivation and the handling was different but I wonder if you feel that the decades a legal pursuit of the Clinton's similarly shows that it was unfounded?
I think they didn't take action against Trump because of a combination of cowardice, party loyalty, and overt obstruction from prominent Republican leadership.
I think it's the same as for the Clintons or Biden. There are probably shady things that they did, but we will never actually know or be able to prove anything. Their enemies certainly tried hard enough without success. Going after them was a political move for them as much as it is/was for Trump, and if you can't prove anything over years of investigation and legal actions then you need to let it go, even if you believe that they are probably guilty.
Just to reiterate, I personally think Trump easily could have colluded with Russians in their interference. I believe that he would do it if he knew he could get away with it, and maybe he did. but apparently nothing can be proven ("insufficient evidence" and all that) so we need to drop it and move on, effectively assuming innocence.
I disagree with the need to drop it and move on part. Conservatives thrive on that. They lie and deny until fatigue sets in and then are never held accountable. Then when we've all moved on they either rewrite history as needed or just act like nothing ever happened. Not dropping it makes their pattern of lies more obvious.
But that just turns the legal system into a weapon for driving public sentiment, another political tool instead of a means to bring justice to criminals. If it never leads to a conviction, at some point you should wonder why. Also you are giving too much credit/blame to conservatives. That might be true if they were always in power, but the they aren't, and haven't been. So why do the Democrats keep letting them get away with it?
Dropping it and moving on is letting them get away with it. Democrats try but the balance between Democrats and Republicans had been too close with a few notable Democrats reliably acting in lockstep with Republicans at critical moments. It is not giving too much blame or credit to conservatives. If you've been paying attention at all during the last 40 years it's what they've been doing.
That's fine but your take is a little too much head in the sand for me. Ignoring their decades long pattern of behavior and insisting on moving on from the things that expose them or attempt to hold them accountable is exactly what they want.
I wouldn't classify Democrats as good. They are a mixed bag. Republicans though I feel comfortable classifying as evil. Because of their policy of loyalty to the party above all else and the unity with which they vote even the "not so bad" ones are complicit and aid the worst of them. The parties are not the same. Republicans are objectively worse. They have been for decades.
Republicans are more unified because their base is more homogeneous compared to Democrats. Republicans basically make up the single biggest demographic in the country, and Democrats are everyone else. Imagine if half of the country were LGBT? They would be able to have their own political party, and would be able to focus on issues specific to their demographic with little concern for other demographics. Democrats biggest challenge is in somehow catering to such a wide variety of interests that don't necessarily align. They have to become more tolerant and accepting of different interests, but there is also a tendency to focus on the one thing they all have in common, which is their political enemy. In that way, Republicans are the only acceptable "bad guys", and everyone on their team is "good". It's tribalism. Republicans do it as well in a slightly different way, more outwardly focused. It's part of human nature and the only way to fight it is to be aware. Of course politicians eagerly embrace and use this dark aspect of humanity as much as they can get away with.
No that's not the case. Republicans are the bad guys on account of what they do. Democrats cast other Democrats as bad guys plenty so your assessment doesn't match reality. Additionally Democrats regularly compromise and work with Republicans while the reverse hardly ever happens so it's not that Republicans are just the default political enemy, it is based on the specific issues. It just so happens that most things republicans want span from dumb to evil. Republican unity is not a demographic thing, at least not in the framing that you are talking. It's a philosophy of blind loyalty.
I guess I don't know what to say then, besides that I strongly disagree. I find it strange that it's so easy for people to dismiss others as "bad" people and don't feel any obligation to try to understand them. For me, the world isn't so black and white as that.
That's ok. Take some comfort in that my take has developed over a long period of time and that I originally counted myself as a centrist/moderate Republican. Also don't mistake my view as not allowing for many shades of gray. My honest assessment of the modern Republican party is that they had flown past every gradient in a race to be as extreme and partisan as possible. McCain was the last decent Republican and even he compromised his integrity for the sake of the party. Also I have tried to understand republicans but they have always failed to coherently reconcile what they claim to believe in with what they do politically.
"As a person of color who has often worked in newsrooms with little to no people who look like me, the efforts NPR has made to diversify its workforce and its sources are unique and appropriate given the news industry's long-standing lack of diversity," Alfonso says. "These efforts should be celebrated and not denigrated as Uri has done."
After this story was first published, Berliner contested Alfonso's characterization, saying his criticism of NPR is about the lack of diversity of viewpoints, not its diversity itself.
"I never criticized NPR's priority of achieving a more diverse workforce in terms of race, ethnicity and sexual orientation. I have not 'denigrated' NPR's newsroom diversity goals," Berliner said. "That's wrong."
Nah, he just talked about how "Race and identity became paramount in nearly every aspect of the workplace" and how a bunch of employee groups based on identity started up, and then directly linked that to the "absence of viewpoint diversity." Totally different. 🙄
I'm really tired of this weasel wordplay that constantly happens, where someone talks about X and then uses that to lead into a point about how this bad thing happened, and when called out, backs off and says "I never blamed X on this bad thing happening." Fuck off with that shit, we all know what you said and we can fucking read, you just don't want to admit it because you know that saying it makes you look racist as all hell.
So let me get this straight, NPR lost America's trust?
America was radicalized by a Australian billionaire and his oil-industry buddies feeding straight up lies to a captive audience, and this is NPR's fault?
Dude, one media company had to pay almost a billion dollars in damages for their election fraud narrative, and that company wasn't NPR.
And yet somehow, this is NPR's fault?
This is some grade-A fascist apologist bullshit, up there with the New York Times whitewashing fascism in Ohio diners and commenting on how nicely Neo Nazis are dressing these days.
They get dinged for supporting Israel and because member stations curate their own content. Texas public radio is very different from Houston public radio which is different from Minnesota public radio and LAist serving southern cali.
Secondly, most conservatives left NPR in general because of their largely factual reporting. Further, at least MPR, they don’t shy away from reporting on republicans or admitting the rare good things they’ve done.
Conservatives responded in one of a few ways:
becoming less conservative (my dad for example is now an independent.)
not listening to NPR and instead going to fox or OAN or Epoch….
listening to those others mentioned and then making angry, terroristic phone calls.
It’s really not NPRs fault this happened- they told the truth as fairly and accurately as they could. And as to her accusation of favoring democrats for political interviews… do you really thing Trump or whoever is going to give an interview to somebody who says things like “but that’s not true.” To your face, when you just spouted some election-fraud lies? Or “do you have any proof?” When you double and triple down on the lie?
Nope. Because that guy looked like an idiot. (I forget who the interview was. Maybe it was one of trumps lawyers or some random pubie.)
Being very factual is what makes it liberal news. It's so slanted, in fact I don't think a single liberal would deny that this is exactly why they tune in! The savages are literally just listening to what they want to hear!
Yea, I bet it really was hard to be a conservative at NPR. Unfortunately, between DEI, Hunter's Laptop, Lab-gate, etc, it's pretty easy to see that this fellow has simply taken modern conservative talking points all at face-value. That is not necessarily a good idea.
edit: Side question: Has anyone else ever noticed a correlation between font size and journalistic integrity, or is it just me?
I find NPR a little annoying for its nonchalant and cutesy way of presenting horrifying news stories. It’s like “Donald Trump tries to commit a coup” and Tamara Keith is like “on today’s show Domenico and I talk about what Trump’s strategy is here for his 2024 run and how this will impact house republicans.”
Or, the US economy is in shambles and Planet Money is like “today we’ll talk about that time the Dutch economy was in shambles in 1770 and what a tulip salesman did to save it. Maybe there will be something we can learn about today’s problems, ahyuck.”
Alan Toffler and his wife Heidi were sociologists in the 1960s. They predicted the "Third Wave" and "Future Shock"
The Third Wave posited that the coming Digital Revolution would change the world as much as the switch from hunting to farming, and the jump from farming to the Industrial Era. "Future Shock" was the term they came up with to describe the social upheaval that comes when people are unwilling/unable to adapt to a rapidly changing world.
Science fiction novelist John Brunner won the 1969 Hugo award for Best Novel. "Stand On Zanzibar" is set in the early 21st Century. Brunner predicted everything from legalized pot to video games to personalized advertising to mass shooters...
McLuhan got a whole lot of stuff right, but I feel like the "global village" turned out to be a Potemkin village. We don't concern ourselves with "everybody else’s" business. We closely watch only the tiny fraction of the world that's magnified by its popularity until it seems like everything. The selection is wider and more diverse than it used to be in the days of television and we have more channels to choose from now, but even the most carefully curated fediverse feed is still a long way from seeing the whole world or the whole picture of any big part of it.
These insights are courtesy of journalist Benjamin Carlson, the author of the linked piece.
Here are 6 things McLuhan got right about our world.
We live most of the time outside our bodies. "When you’re on the telephone, or on radio, or on TV, you don’t have a physical body," he says here in 1977. "You’re just an image on the air. When you don’t have a physical body you’re a discarnate being. You have a very different relation to the world around you." By spending most of our time online, we relate to the world not as creatures of flesh and blood—but as floating images.
Our identities are porous. When we relate to one another as massless images, instantaneously around the world, we detach from our private selves, and are submerged in other people's cares, concerns, histories. The electronic age "has deprived people, really, of their private identity," he says. "Everybody tends to merge his identity with other people at the speed of light."
Social media is changing us neurologically and psychologically. "The medium is the message," his most famous dictum, says the most important change wrought by any new technology is not its content, but its form. In other words, when it comes to substantively impacting the human species, it’s not what’s said on social media that matters. What matters is that social media is part of our lives.
AI makes job specialization irrelevant. With the rise of automation, McLuhan predicted:
work and leisure become intermixed. information is monetized; self-employment rises; and retraining repeatedly for new roles becomes the new norm for our careers.
In the global village, we all are gossips and snoops. As geographic limits break down, our curiosity about others' dramas runs rampant. "The global village is at once as wide as the planet and as small as a little town where everybody is maliciously engaged and poking his nose into everybody else’s business," McLuhan says. "The global village is a world in which you don’t necessarily have harmony. You have extreme concern with everybody else’s business. And much involvement in everybody else’s life."
AI makes—and remakes—information just for you. For better or worse, we no longer live in the same world of facts. Facts are presented a la carte and personalized. When you need to know something, "you will go to the telephone, describe your interests, your needs and your problems," McLuhan says. "And they at once Xerox, with the help of computers from the libraries of the world, all the latest material just for you personally, not as something to be put out on the bookshelf."
To make some criticism:
The first point seems to be true. But the reasoning doesn't work. TV or radio doesn't have the potential to do this.
The second is merely a open question.
The fourth point has not yet occurred. You compare a predicition with another!
The fifth point is vaguely reminiscent of political correctness, but the web is precisely the place where the opposite also takes place.
I'm not sure what your point was, but presumably it wasn't that you've spent so much time being on TV that you know what it's like better than Marshall McLuhan did. His thoughts might be difficult to understand today because for one thing we assume so much about how television works as a broadcast medium that was still questionable even as late as the 1970s. Back then there were more possibilities as to how it might evolve. Instead it was replaced, in its role as an exciting new communications medium. But the experience of being in so-called cyberspace, even this part of it, does still have a little something in common with what it was like being on television fifty years ago.
I mean, the internet can be used by nearly anyone.
The classical tv, on the other hand, is limited to a very tiny group of prominent persons and a great audience of passiv listener.
With any predictions one must beware of the human tendency to find ways to fit vague predictions to reality to make them true.
1 is an interesting take but sounds a little like new age hippy shit lol. What I think is more an issue is that we exist in very strange territory compared to the primary mode of existence during virtually all of our evolution.
2 I have no idea what they're talking about here. I don't see how interacting with others has any affect on my identity whether I'm a floating net ghost or in person?
3 "the media is the message" is nebulous to me. I think what's said on social media makes a big impact; e.g. online bullying, toxicity, etc. But also the use of social media is probably having all kinds of impacts in how we live. Things were different in the days before social media or even before the internet.
4 Yet to be seen but I think society is mostly set up for the rich to benefit disproportionately from any technological advances.
On item 2: You don't see how interacting with people affects you as well as those you interact with?
Of course I know how I am affected interacting with others...
But that's NOT what #2 says.
Item #2 is claiming my very IDENTITY is affected. I merge with others somehow. But only online. Because I am non-corporal or something. At least that is how I read it. And I don't think that happens at all.
As I understand the concept of "identity," it is fairly static over time. It isn't going to change just because I interact with someone online.
Now I might become crabby af when interacting with certain kinds of people enough times in single day. But that's just me feeling crabby. My identity doesn't change.
I might change beliefs if provided evidence to support it.
Both of these examples are just as true in person.
Maybe I'm just an idiot reading #2 wrong. It was super early and the ADHD meds didn't kick in. Wouldn't be the first time. Peace.
I agree that our identity is affected by others, but in every interaction. Online or off. It's not always dramatic, but I would still say everyone is influenced by interacting with others. This includes the core of their identity, just like all other experiences affect and shape who you are, what you believe, etc.
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